


his hour upon the stage

by Sidonie



Category: Glee
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-28
Updated: 2011-11-28
Packaged: 2017-10-26 15:20:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/284803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sidonie/pseuds/Sidonie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some people live. Jesse performs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	his hour upon the stage

**Author's Note:**

> This piece was very experimental in voice for me, as well as being a way to work through my intense Jesse St. James feelings. It's heavy on theater, music, and introspection. Enjoy!

Jesse St. James is a Soloist (and yes, the capital letter _is_ necessary, thank you very much). This is not a role he plays in a given song or musical or dance number, not a choice, not an opinion. This is Jesse, the core of him, the truth of the matter. It is a _fact_. Despite the wishy-washy emotional yo-yo of a liberal arts worldview many (most) performers abide by, Jesse is very big on facts. There are right ways and wrong ways to go about things, there are _laws_ of the universe (Barbra Streisand is likely among them, he muses), and one is that certain people never play second fiddle. (Not to say he hasn't had supporting roles, everyone's experienced off auditions or vindictive directors, but in Jesse's hands they become _starring_ roles, and he wears the label “shameless scene-stealer” with pride.)

The reason is this: there is a transcendence in solos. The theater—every aspect of that sprawling, massive beast from shop to green room to stage—is a religion. This is not hyperbole; this is another _fact_. All who work in the theater are acolytes, priests, whose mission is to bring glory to their ephemeral, soul-shaking, occasionally sequined God.

The moment of a solo, then, is apotheosis, only to be entrusted to the high priest, the one person who can stand at sacred center stage and allow their human imperfections to burn away in the heat of the spotlight, who can shed their everyday selves like so much ash and be assumed, body and soul, into the music. It's part pain, part revelation, part hard work, and part natural-born talent.

 _This_ is why precious few performers will ever be Soloists.

People have asked, often and loudly, when Jesse St. James knew he would be a _star_ (he glows a little every time they say it, even though he's heard it a million times). His answer is never the same in form—because good storytelling is about the _moment_ , about living what you are presenting, and breathing life into a role means opening it up to the fractured kaleidoscope of chaos theory and irrevocable choices that become transformative changes—but it is constant at its center: _always_. Always and forever, from the moment he was born and commanded his parents' attention. Jesse has never spent a second being anything less.

One of the most important qualities a Soloist must have is selfishness. They're called stars because yes, everything revolves around them. (Again, _fact_.) They are the blazing center of any and every production, and without them all collapses into darkness and cold, dead-eyed audiences who applaud politely and leave without having experienced anything approaching catharsis. A true Soloist, someone who pronounces the capital letter with deliberate relish every time he or she speaks the word, understands that for a star selfishness is a sort of self _less_ ness, because the same weighty sense of self-importance (gravity) that makes them needy attention sponges in their day-to-day existence is also the magnetism and charm that rivets an audience to them, that pulls their emotions and skill tight in their chest until they combust, shining in performance. It's called _stage presence_ , and it is essential.

Rachel Berry is also a Soloist. Jesse knows this from the moment he sets eyes on her. She is glowing in the spotlight, exuberant, joyful, perfectly at home, belting "Don't Rain on My Parade" with a flair that is more raw talent than finesse. She is captivating, loud and brazen and utterly without nuance and _perfect_. If they weren't competitors at the time he would have applauded wildly, but they are, so he restrains himself to the polite clapping and smug smile that scream “nice try, congratulations on second place.” Later he tells her she lacked emotional depth—and it's true, he is never dishonest about constructive criticism—but he doesn't tell her that for the length of the song, watching her set the stage on fire, he hadn't much cared.

Jesse has perfect control over himself—posture, expressions, speech, movement, emotions, everything. In order to act one must be able to fit a new mold at a moment's notice. It can be problematic, actually; actors can easily experience crises of identity, their ability to transform eating away at their sense of individual personhood. They soak up accents like sponges, copy gestures and interesting inflections, fit themselves into the roles they know others want them to play. It's a habit for Jesse, adjusting the way he acts to fit expectations, but he is never overwhelmed, his strength of personality keeping uncertainty at bay. He knows who he is, he knows what he does, and his every move is a _choice_ , a conscious decision in line with the person he is being at a given moment.

Which is why he's a little unsettled when, upon meeting Rachel Berry face-to-face, he suddenly finds himself sitting at the piano, a duet version of “Hello” in front of him, unable to remember how he got there. It is spontaneity, and Jesse is _never_ spontaneous. He can't remember making the choice to use music as seduction—it gets too personal, he finds, and hinders the performance—and he can't remember what he'd done to elicit the doe-eyed look she's giving him. Her heart is in her eyes (it's appalling, really, she should at least know how to feign disinterest) as she trembles by his side, eager and apprehensive and _honest_.

It occurs to Jesse, briefly, that he has never made a habit of honesty.

The thought melts away as he begins to play, the feeling of the keys beneath his fingers reminding him of warm red walls, looming bookcases, sunshine pooling like honey on the bench of the piano that sat in a corner, impressively elegant, unused until four-year-old Jesse developed an obsession. It's an association so familiar he's never lost sight of it, and he relaxes into the music.

The words are forward—perhaps too forward, even for his purpose—but he _means_ them, as he means every performance in the moment. He worries that she'll shy away, this fragile-looking girl with her big dark eyes who still confesses to _nervousness_ , of all things, but then she closes her eyes and leans into the song—on their first breath together her gaze snaps back to him, playful and focused, her intensity matching his step for step, so that by the chorus he's undressing her with his eyes and she's grinning through her vowels and by the end they're nearly nose-to-nose and he has her, he knows he does, but if someone were to say she also has him, they might not be far from the truth.

Rachel Berry may be a Soloist, but she is also a natural at duets. And that, in a way, is as difficult (never more, nothing is _more_ than a solo, but Jesse is willing to grant equal difficulty), because duets are predicated on the willingness of another person to harmonize with the same ferocity and involvement, driven by the same basic impulse, effortlessly falling in step. Moreover, they assume that energy offered up will be returned in kind. They are give and take, and for all that his volunteer resume and college applications speak volumes of his generosity, Jesse is not very practiced at giving of himself. Rachel, on the other hand, dives in without hesitation, every necessary emotion figured in her voice, and Jesse is reminded violently of what drew him to her in the first place, the blatant, unstudied passion in her every gesture.

Jesse has never been unstudied in his life. He is a creature of meticulous control, conscious performance, and it has served him well. But sitting here on a piano bench, shoulder-to-shoulder with the girl sporting the most openly adoring stare he's ever received, he wonders if it would be so terrible to be . . . less so.

Not for long. Certainly not forever.

Just for the space of a duet.


End file.
